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Comment by paul7986 | Hacker News Reader

How long does it take to charge if my EV battery is at about zero with a supercharger? The same time it takes to pump gas?

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Depends on the EV. A few years back I did a ~400 mile road trip in a Model Y. We had to make one top-up charging stop which took about 15 minutes. We walked to a spot and got a snack while we waited.

A similarly-sized ICE vehicle could have possibly done the trip without a stop, or required a quick 5-minute top-up depending on conditions.

I've done lots of long road trips in ICE vehicles and we usually stop to walk around and stretch for about the same amount of time and with the same frequency as charge stops call for.

If you're trying to shave every minute off of a trip you'd come out behind, but IMO you're a glutton for punishment if you're trying to race through a 1000+ mile road trip without stopping for more than 5 minutes at a time.

I travel a lot in my SUV in remote areas like between Reno and Vegas.

As a gas driver I like the fact there's a gas station in remote areas and it takes me three minutes to fill my tank and go.

When do we think as interested EV driver will my driving experience match my gas car diving experience and needs? Are we there yet?

I'm guessing 5-10 years. However in 30 years the opposite question will be the case - if you are driving a gas car you will have to plan ahead. As EVs take over gas stations will start to disappear.

Well maybe you hope ..have skin in this game... as nothing is for certain. Hybrids seems to becoming even more popular as well other car manufacturers are looking into hydrogen and other sources.

In five to ten years we'll see if indeed there are more EV chargers everywhere like there are currently gas stations. An infrastructure that's over a 100 years old.

I'm all for new tech but as a UX professional new tech needs to provide an even better experience which personally something like a key fob (can be RFID hacked, you lose the fob you have to get your car towed to dealer and pay additional / hundreds for a new key fob)is a terrible UX compared to just a metal key (can't be hacked.. can easily drive to dealer to have a metal key made).

The hybrids I see have so little range on battery only that it may as well not be an option. Meanwhile if you charge at home electric is much cheaper than gas when you can find otherwise similar vehicles to compare. Sure hybrid does save gas and so is cheaper, but the savings I could get from a car that does all my normal daily trips on battery only are compelling.

FWIW there are ~9 superchargers along Highway 95 between Reno and Vegas, and it's a 400 mile trip. You would probably only need to stop and charge once.

Maybe in future with different approach like https://youtube.com/watch?v=VmWL1hZQmD0

Oh just maybe (yikes) ..I'm on the fence about buying an EV as gas car provides me the best experience for my needs. I drive a Ton and in remote areas too

Do those places have no power sockets?

Regular outlets are limited to 1.5 kW, so charging a car takes more than a day.

You assume the slowest outlet + full tank worth of driving. Possible, but not how most road trips happen.

Are you imagining a road trip where you ask random strangers to move their oven and run a cord out the window for several hours?

It depends on the EV and the supercharger. But in general it'll be slower than pumping gas. My CCS car takes around 15-18 minutes to get to 80% (because of diminishing charging curves, with most (all?) cars it's faster to do 5 charging stops from 0-80% than 4 charging stops from 0-100).

I haven't done a super long road trip in an EV, but for drives with 1-2 charging stops it doesn't feel that different than ICE cars, especially if have passengers and invariably end up waiting for everyone to go to the bathroom, get a snack, etc. Only exception is places like quartzite where there can be a long line of EVs waiting to charge.

we took a road trip last summer about 4000 miles in our model Y Long range. You end up supercharging approximately every three hours for about 15 minutes. it actually worked out very well because our first stop of the day was almost always lunch. we picked hotels that had chargers on site so we started each day with enough charge to make the next supercharger.

Were you traveling in remote areas something like between Reno and Vegas or other similar long remote stretches?

There's 3 Tesla superchargers between Vegas to Reno, in Beatty, Tonopah and Hawthorne, which is roughly 1/4, 1/2 and 3/4 of the way through. So definitely doable but definitely less convenient than an ICE car that can make that drive in one shot without refueling.

So stop in Tonopah NV,which is half way inbetween. Most EVs have the range to make it that far. I just picked that town by looking at a map - I'm sure there are a couple other choices even tough it is a desolate area.

I don't know if there is a charger there today, but it is an obvious place where one is likely to be added sometime.

minneapolis, mn to kitty hawk, nc

No. Much longer. And it depends massively on battery size too since they vary quite a bit more than gas tank sizes.

https://insideevs.com/reviews/516438/tesla-supercharger-comp...

Battery size only really matters if you are maxing out the charger since the amount of power the battery can take scales with kwhs. To be fair being charger limited is pretty common currently, but in ideal conditions a larger battery will be able to charge more miles/minute than a smaller one.

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